


see your face when i black out, i'm never coming back

by nervousn8



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Also if you squint, Angst, Billy Hargrove & Maxine "Max" Mayfield Have a Good Relationship, Enemies to Friends, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Hurt No Comfort, If You Squint - Freeform, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Neil Hargrove's A+ Parenting, Sharing a Bed, fuck that guy, they don't really get the chance, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:27:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28146834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nervousn8/pseuds/nervousn8
Summary: There's something to be said about safety. Billy's never been safe, but there's something to be said about it, anyway.He just won't be the one to say it.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove & Maxine "Max" Mayfield, Billy Hargrove & Steve Harrington, Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 6
Kudos: 59





	see your face when i black out, i'm never coming back

There’s something to be said about safety.

When Billy was younger, so,  _ so _ much younger, safety had been his parents. Both of them. Safety had been the way Neil looked at his mom. Safety had been the way his mom laughed when Neil would press little kisses to her jaw. Safety was their hands in his tiny ones, swinging him up over the waves when they came in too high for his tiny legs. Safety was the smell of his mom’s perfume and the loud way Neil would shake the sand from his shoes.

Neil stopped being safe, eventually. He stopped looking at Billy’s mom like he loved her, stopped holding Billy’s hand when they crossed the street. Stopped coming to play in the waves with them. Billy didn’t really get it at first, didn’t understand that his dad wasn’t safe anymore. Even when Neil started hitting his mom, Billy still didn’t really get it. He’d only ever been hit when he was bad, so maybe his mom had just been bad. Maybe it would be over when she stopped. 

His mom was safe, though, and Billy loved her. He was always safe with her in the waves, hanging onto her legs while she surfed before he was old enough to surf on his own board. He was safe in her arms, tucked in close when he fell and scraped his knees and elbows. He was safe in her laugh when he said something she thought was funny, safe in the waves of her hair when she taught him how to braid it. He was safe tucked behind her when Neil got angry, hidden by her words and her rage. 

His mom was a fire, but not the kind that hurt. While Neil was a forest fire, all-consuming, damaging, scathing, his mom was a campfire. She could be a forest fire if she needed to, but she wasn’t. She kept Billy warm, kept him safe when it was dark. She was safe.

And then she was gone.

Billy wasn’t safe, not anymore. Not even his bed was safe, all his blankets and stuffed animals. Neil got rid of all of them, piled them up in a big black bag and took them away with all of Billy’s mom’s things. All he got was the pendant, and he had to hide it from Neil because Neil wasn’t safe anymore. Billy didn’t know what he was doing wrong anymore, either. He fixed everything Neil told him he was doing bad, but somehow he still messed it up. 

Susan wasn’t safe, either. Not for Billy. Probably not for Max. Neil still got mad at him when they weren’t around, still punished him when he didn’t even know what he did wrong. Billy sometimes wondered when Susan would see it, sometimes wondered if she’d do anything to keep him safe. If she’d throw plates and scream and hide him behind her legs like his mom used to. He wondered if she’d love him just as fiercely as his mom did. He didn’t know if he wanted her to.

The first time Susan saw Neil hit him, it wasn’t even that hard. That’s why Billy thought she didn’t intervene: because it wasn’t that hard and he’d been being bad, so he deserved it. But then the second time, when he didn’t deserve it, Susan just watched. Susan wasn’t going to intervene, and Susan didn’t love him, and Susan wasn’t safe.

Billy’s friends weren’t safe, either, but they were warm. They were friendly and they loved him to the best of their abilities, and even though they didn’t make him feel safe, they made him feel warm. They didn’t ask about his bruises because he hid them so well -and maybe they didn’t care, no one else really seemed to- and they laughed when he told them jokes, so they were okay. They were warm.

The boy on the beach was dangerous, and Billy knew that from the beginning. But he has this new thing he does where he gets in trouble on purpose, makes Neil hurt him for a  _ reason, _ so he can feel like he deserves it. Because recently he’s started to feel like he doesn’t deserve it, and if he doesn’t deserve it then there’s something very,  _ very _ wrong, and Billy doesn’t want to think about that. So he gets in trouble on purpose and Susan doesn’t stop Neil because he deserves it, and everything works out.

Billy doesn’t learn the boy’s name. He learns his sounds and his smells and his tastes, but never his name. It’s better that way, anyway. When Neil sees them talking together by the waves, Billy can say he doesn’t even know his name, and he’s not even lying. Neil always knows when he lies. He makes sure not to learn anything of substance about the guy, even if the afterimages of his dark skin bathed in saltwater haunt Billy’s every dream.

Max isn’t safe. Billy never thought a  _ child _ would be what did him in, what burned his perfectly constructed picture to the ground, but she was. The worst part is,  _ the worst part is, _ he doesn’t even think she knows. She’s so naive, so lost in the fact that her big brother is so mean to her, that she throws him under the bus without even thinking. Anything to see him get in trouble. When Billy gets in trouble Susan takes her out for ice cream, and she doesn’t know what happens after. She doesn’t need to know what happens after.

Because Max isn’t safe, sure, not for Billy, but she isn’t  _ safe, _ either. Billy’s seen the bruises on Susan’s dainty wrists, seen the way she shuts down when Neil yells at him. She doesn’t get it as bad as he does, but after Max does something that Neil really doesn’t like, after he’s put Billy in his place for something he didn’t do, Susan gets it, too. In place of Max. If Billy weren’t there to take the brunt of it, Max wouldn’t be safe. She’d be where he was when he was her age, and even if sometimes he so desperately craves for Neil to do it to Max, too, he also doesn’t. Even though he wants Max to understand, he knows she doesn’t deserve it. 

Knows somewhere, deep in his own mind, that he doesn’t deserve it. That none of them do. He knows that they all deserve to be safe and loved and warm, but those weren’t the cards they were dealt. It’s easier to think he deserves it than to know that he doesn’t.

Billy isn’t safe, hasn’t been in a long, _long_ time. He’s not safe as he drives his car, his only place that can even feel remotely safe sometimes, across the country. He isn’t safe as he unpacks his few boxes of things into the empty front room, secluded away from the other bedrooms. He isn’t safe anywhere in Hawkins. Not at the top of the food chain in the high school, not at the edge of the quarry, not in the dead of night. He isn’t safe anywhere anymore.

And then -it’s almost funny, really- he meets Steve Harrington.

Harrington doesn’t fix anything; he makes it all worse. He makes  _ everything _ worse. He keeps Max in some shady as fuck house at midnight with a bunch of boys her age and won’t let Billy take her home, goes as far as to punch him and make him bleed, thinks he’s enough to send Billy running. And the thing is, Billy’s scared. He’s  _ terrified. _ He’s never lived in a place with a woods like this before, but he doesn’t think the woods are supposed to make the noises the ones in Hawkins do. He’s seen shit out of the corner of his eye the entire time he’s been driving around looking for Max. Neil is going to fucking  _ kill him _ when he finally brings Max home.

Billy’s not safe, and he’s backed into a corner and he’s so,  _ so _ scared, so he lashes out. He nearly kills Harrington and he doesn’t feel bad about it, not at all. He’s going to drag Max home as soon as he’s taught Harrington a lesson with his fists, even if that lesson puts Harrington in an early grave. 

_ (Even if all he can see is Neil under him. Even if none of it is really directed at Harrington.) _

He thinks Max finally figures out what Neil does to punish him this time. Susan doesn’t take her to get ice cream because it’s five in the morning on a Sunday, and Billy watches her watch him as Neil beats his face in. Watches through swelling, watery eyes as she slams a hand over her mouth in tandem with Neil’s boot slamming into his ribs. He feels strangely validated, watching her run away down the hallway. Now she knows what her fuck ups do to him.

Billy figures out pretty quickly that he actually preferred when Max didn’t know. She still isn’t safe, both for him and for herself. He doesn’t like it. The way she frowns at him when he shows up at the table in the morning with a bruise he didn’t have the night before, the way she goes to say something and then doesn’t. He doesn’t like the way she seems to think they’re friends now, like she didn’t drug him and threaten his balls with a nail-studded bat.

He doesn’t like that she apologizes to him. Doesn’t like that he almost believes her. Doesn’t like that he sometimes forget to tag ‘step’ in front of ‘sister’ when he talks about her, now. 

She’s not safe. She cries too loudly when she comes crumbling into his room at night, clinging to the front of his tank top and getting snot all over his shoulders. She isn’t safe because Billy gets angry on her behalf, now, seethes with the violent urge to  _ hurt _ when she just barely chokes out Harrington’s name amidst her sobbing. She’s not safe because when Billy corners Harrington about it, slams him so hard into the lockers once everyone is gone that he starts coughing, she yells at him for it and he  _ feels bad. _

Max isn’t safe for him because now he feels like he has to protect her more than he ever had before, and that means keeping an eye on the person who keeps showing up in her nightmares even though she won’t tell him why. He’s not safe anymore because he’s willingly spending time with Harrington, crowding into his space and riling himself up with the inescapable urge to beat his face in like he had in November. 

He doesn’t. He’s waiting, exercising patience he doesn’t even really have. He wants to find out why.

Harrington is the exact opposite of safe, and Billy hates him for it. Hates him for the way he carries himself, hates him for the way he stares like he’s entitled, hates him for the way Max seems to adore him. Hates him, even more, when Harrington shows up in the woods near his house with the nail bat in the middle of a snowstorm with no explanation except Max thought she saw something and wanted him to check. 

He’s not safe because, for some reason Billy will never be able to decipher _-he’ll never get the chance-_ Harrington makes him feel  _ safe. _ He’s not safe because safety is a lie, especially when it comes from Harrington, of all people. No guy who looks like he barely sleeps and carries a bat full of nails in the trunk of his car should be safe. Nothing about Harrington screams safety, and still Billy feels safe. He hates it.

They sleep back to back the first time Billy ever makes the mistake of staying over.

He doesn’t mean to fall asleep on the stupidly plush couch in Harrington’s den, but when he jolts awake to the sound of screaming somewhere else in the house, that’s exactly where he is. Sprinting up the stairs while he follows the sound of screaming -which has since devolved into ugly sobbing- isn’t his smartest move, isn’t safe, but he does it. Throws open the bedroom door he knows is Harrington’s and feels like he’s about to comfort Max. Feels like he  _ is _ when Harrington sobs into the shoulder of his denim jacket and holds onto him like he’s going to disappear.

They don’t talk about it, afterward. Harrington apologizes, eyes downcast as he asks Billy to stay.

He’s warm against Billy’s back, the curve of his spine pressed against Billy’s. Shoulder blades touching. There’s no obligation to stay like this, no arms locking him in. Billy could leave whenever he wanted to, could get up and shimmy his boots back on and leave, could walk out the front door and get in his car and sneak back in through his bedroom window. But he doesn’t do those things, because even though Harrington is a psycho who somehow traumatized Max, even though he keeps the bat full of nails right beside his bed and can’t sleep with the lights off, he makes Billy feel safe. 

Billy  _ hates _ him.

_ (They’re friends.) _

Steve’s safe. It’s a realization that comes when Billy’s drunk out of his mind and bleeding all over Steve’s bathroom floor, watching in mild fascination as nimble, guitar calloused hands wipe the blood from a nasty gash on his thigh and stitch it closed. It comes when Steve takes his head in his hands, long fingers sliding into the blond curls behind Billy’s ears, and he tilts his head from side to side in a slow motion to make sure he isn’t hurt. It comes when Steve just laughs softly at being openly stared at. 

Billy’s safe here, bruising face tucked into the spare pillow that smells like his own hair products, now. Safe with his back pressed to Steve’s, safe in the soft lamplight from the bedside table. Even though Steve’s kind of a psychopath with equally psychotic friends and a penchant for mothering middle schoolers, Billy feels safe. He’s safe here, buried under ugly plaid sheets, the heat of his friend passing through their t-shirts and digging out a place right in Billy’s chest cavity.

He’s safe in the way Steve laughs so hard he starts wheezing, grabbing a handful of Billy’s jacket to hold himself up. He’s safe in the way Max laughs at Steve laughing, safe in how Steve’s friends are kind of his friends now, safe in how none of the nerd brigade hates him anymore. 

Billy’s safe in Steve’s eyes when he first wakes up in the morning, bleary-eyed and squinty as he stumbles into the kitchen with a pout stuck to his face. He’s safe in Steve’s eyes when he passes him the basketball and he scores the points they need to win. He’s safe in the trust that Steve places in him, safe in the knowledge that even after all of it, after everything they’ve been through that they don’t talk about, Steve thinks he’s safe, too.

He’s safe in Steve’s eyes as he bleeds out on the floor of Starcourt mall. 

Even after this last week of hell, even after they fought about something Billy can’t even remember, even after a monster turned his brain to mush and made him kill  _ so many people, _ he feels safe on this tiled floor because Steve is smiling down at him, leaning over to stroke his thumb on Billy’s cheek and smile, and Billy feels safe. He  _ is _ safe. Steve’s safe.

Billy hasn’t been safe in a long,  _ long _ time. He’s been scared and angry and alone for almost as long as he can remember, missing a mother who left him, fearing a father who didn’t. But here and now, even though he’s so tired, even though he’s falling asleep and his torso kind of hurts a lot, he’s safe. He’s safe because Steve is here, and Steve is warm against his cooling skin, and Steve is safe. He’s blurry, but he’s safe. Billy’s safe.

If Billy’s honest with himself, which he never is, he’s been safe with Steve for a long time. He remembers the feeling of being safe, being warm in the soft atmosphere of the little corner Steve and his friends commandeered at the Halloween party all that time ago. He’s been safe since he got lost in the wispy quality of Steve’s voice as he hummed along to the chords he played on his guitar. He’s been safe since he joined that crowd of stoners on the floor and got lost in it all, since Steve carried him away to some far off place with just his voice.

But Billy isn’t honest with himself. He’s the exact opposite of honest with himself, because honesty means being known, and he doesn’t want that. He’s never wanted that. He’s not safe if he’s known. He’s not safe.

But he is. He’s safe here, watching Steve slowly fade out of view. He’s safe with Steve. 

There’s something to be said about safety, but Billy won’t be the one to say it.

Not anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> the title is from SYML's song "Fear of the Water". felt like the lyrics applied, you know? haha. sorry.
> 
> i changed some things, obviously bc fuck the duffel bags, but not everything


End file.
